June 25, 2026
The trailer for Taika Waititi’s latest film is finally here, and it presents a future in which AI isn’t a sinister, scheming emerging superintelligence intent on replacing humans. Instead, the film, Klara and the Sun, based on Kazuo Ishiguro’s 2021 novel, depicts a world in which genetically enhanced humans are aided by deliberately intellectually hobbled androids that often have a childlike innocence.
Starring Amy Adams (Her, Arrival), Jenna Ortega (Wednesday), Natasha Lyonne (Russian Doll, Orange Is the New Black), and Steve Buscemi (Fargo, Reservoir Dogs), despite the film’s science fiction premise, it’s visually a low-budget, drama-driven affair that’s focused on relationships. Ortega seems to do a good job playing the solar-powered android in Waititi’s satirical take on AI-driven automatons. At several points, there seem to be references to Steven Spielberg‘s 2001 film A.I. Artificial Intelligence (Childlike robot in a big scary city? Check. Fears of being discarded? Check. Teddy bear? Check.)
Although Ishiguro’s novel was widely praised upon its debut in 2021, framing AI as innocent and sympathetic in 2026 will likely be a stretch for most audiences. When the novel was released five years ago, the public discourse on AI among mainstream audiences was limited to tales of sci-fi, not rooted in very real AI-driven layoffs, increasing numbers of commercial books exposed as AI-generated, and every other AI executive telling the public that AI superintelligence doom is on the way in the next few years.
Can Waititi’s comedic talents (Thor: Ragnarok, What We Do in the Shadows), along with a well-liked cast, overcome the seemingly bad timing of this “please God, save the robots” tale? We’ll find out soon, as the film is set to hit theaters on October 23. Universal Pictures’ Disclosure Day will hit theaters on June 12, 2026.
Cover via YouTube/Sony Pictures
